Brief Encounter

  100.  That’s the mind-breaking number of points scored by Wilt Chamberlain in one basketball game in March, 1962.  Since there was no immediate media coverage of the game, some are claiming it never happened.  Just too impossible.  But Pablo Torres, the sportswriter, took the time to find and interview several fans who were there and swear the number is correct.

100.  That’s the number of times my friends have probably heard me tell about my encounter with Wilt.  So why not make it 101?  It was on a flight to New York.  I was wearing my silver fox fur jacket.  I admit I looked pretty spiffy.  As I walked down the aisle, a very large man wearing a purple suede jumpsuit gave me a big smile.  “Nice jacket”, he said.

During the flight, the attendant announced that several famous basketball players were on board and willing to sign autographs.  She mentioned Wilt Chamberlain.  I wasn’t a fan back then so the name meant little to me.  As I picked up my bag, Wilt came over to me and smiled again, “Nice jacket.”

It was only later that I learned of his basketball and other exploits.  He claimed “romance” with 20,000 women.  Ah Wilt, you never passed up an opportunity to score.

Safe Times

 I was well into middle age before I began writing.  My friend Marsha inspired me to hold out for a creative job.  I listened because I was Joan Chandler now.  It took more than a year on the temp trail before I finally was hired to write copy for the National Safety Council.

The salary was pitiful. But I had some divorce money and it was a start.  The universe smiled because eventually the Council hired consultants to evaluate salaries and I ended up with decent money.

I enjoyed writing and producing all kinds of safety stuff. I was good at it and I got a lot done. But I was not a team player. I was impatient and had no respect for the big bosses.  Others in the department felt the same.  It was “The Office” way before that show ever made it onto TV.

One year, when told we could decorate our cubicles for Christmas, we found a life-size Elvis and played “Blue Christmas” on an endless loop. Tiny victories add up.   

I'm still glad to  see Annie and Julia.  Gayle wrote a good book,  Lisa is one of my best friends. Myles and I are going out for breakfast today.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

March Madness

 March Madness is just around the corner.  I don’t follow college basketball very closely and I don’t think Northwestern will get in,  so I’ll just pick a team. 

It was different in 2005.  Illinois kept winning. By the time the whole family was in LA for Miro’s Bar Mitzvah, they were playing in the serious games.  As we left for the party, my son-in-law Shelby decided to stay behind to watch the fourth quarter.  “I’ll catch up with you later.”

We all clapped and laughed when Shelby, normally a very soft spoken man, came storming into the room:  “They won!  They won!  They were way down and came roaring back!”

Illinois went on to play in the championship game.  They lost to North Carolina and haven’t been back since.  But Shelby had that moment of pure joy.  That’s why we love the "madness" of being a fan.

Edythe

 Edythe was my other best teenage friend.  We usually got together at her house. Her mother was a beautiful woman with very long red hair who would give us a smile and drift off to another room to play the piano.  Edythe’s brother was a creep.  He was only a few years older, and he wore a suit!  He would never join us, but I knew he was outside the door listening.  I got the feeling that Edythe was the one who made sure the house ran smoothly.

My mother gossiped about Edythe’s father.  “He has an unsavory reputation.  He is a dentist who advertises and runs an assembly like practice.”  Edythe was her father’s gal.  She was poised for success.

I went off to college and Edythe went off to “finishing school.”  She “married well” and settled in Virginia.  I wasn’t completely surprised when years later she ran as the Democratic candidate for the Senate from Virginia.  She lost to John Warner (the one who was married to Elizabeth Taylor).

I needed to be around Edythe’s confidence and determination.  She never let me down. 

String of Pearls

 Kenny was my best friend during my high school years.  We both worked one college summer at Saks Fifth Avenue.  My mother was convinced that we would marry one day.  I knew nothing about homosexuality then, just that she was wrong about that.  Not Kenny.

I was in Chicago, married with small children when his name caught my eye.  He was Kenneth J. Lane, the jewelry designer.  The creator of Barbara Bush’s famous pearls. 

It was years before I saw him again. I was along on one of Len’s business trips to New York.  We went to visit Kenny at his town house.  His butler greeted us at the door.  Kenny was friendly but he was definitely Kenneth J. Lane.  

I kept track of him through the years, was so grateful that he didn’t die of Aids, but of natural causes when he was in his eighties.  It was a chance for my other high school buddy, Edythe, and I to reconnect .  We laughed and cried remembering Kenny ... and so many teenage times.

Discontinued

 I read an article about people searching online for favorite items no longer in stores.  Paying big money if they are lucky enough to find them.  I have suffered the loss of so many small pleasures through the scourge of “discontinued.”

I still think fondly of Burny Bros. cinnamon toast bread. There was a time when Burny Bros. Bakeries were everywhere in Chicagoland.  Heinemann’s too.  (Heinemann’s has a small afterlife at my local Jewel.)

Long gone from my neighborhood, I was delighted one day to see the familiar Burny Bros. sign as I was walking in the loop.  When I asked for a loaf of my favorite bread, the clerk said: “That’s been gone for years.  When the bakery was sold to those big shots, it was the one recipe that the family held on to.” 

So now, I imagine somewhere one of the brothers or a descendant is popping a loaf into the oven.  I can smell and taste it even now.

Harvard

 Between my sophomore and junior year of college I attended Harvard summer school.  On a whim my friend Edythe decided to go too.  We drove to Cambridge in her convertible with my brother’s friend Stan who was a Harvard student.

It was a great time.  On campus and in Cambridge you could always find a stimulating conversation. We went to Cape Cod on the weekends.  We drove down to Manhattan so I could reconnect with an old boyfriend.  And in between we managed to take some classes.

The class I remember the most wasn't for the content.  It was because the teaching instructor was Timothy Leary.  Of course that name meant nothing to me at the time.  His stamp on the 60’s and beyond lay ahead.